ITALIAN BROTHERS 3 ENRICO PICCIN by Andrej Koymasky (C) 2005 written on February 2, 1996 translated by the author English text kindly revised by Dave
USUAL DISCLAIMER
"ITALIAN BROTHERS 3 - ENRICO PICCIN" is a gay story, with some parts containing graphic scenes of sex between males. So, if in your land, religion, family, opinion and so on this is not good for you, it will be better not to read this story. But if you really want, or because YOU don't care, or because you think you really want to read it, please be my welcomed guest.
CHAPTER 11 . The farewell
Following the coast road, they went up along the Calabria. From the inland villages were arriving deputations to communicate to the victorious general the will of their populations to participate in the referendum, whose news had already spread like a lightning, and were requesting him to send to their villages one of his representatives. Garibaldi, even though this was somewhat slowing down their march, gave audience to all the delegations and tried to content all of them, leaving in all the most important village one of his man as a representative and in the provincial capitals a governor.
During a halt, arrived a woman, tousled and in tears. She was speaking in a broad dialect and only when a Calabrian volunteer arrived to translate they could understand what she wanted - her man had fallen in an ambush, a settling of old scores, had been wounded at his chest by a sawn-off shotgun and was now dying. The village doctor didn't want to treat him, as he said it was useless, but the woman didn't believe him and was now asking if there was a doctor.
Enrico with Maurizio took the bag with the surgical tools and, escorted for security reason by four armed volunteers, followed the woman. The man was laid on his back, on the grass. His chest was horribly devastated. Helped by Maurizio, Enrico tried to see if he could do something to help, but it was evident that the man's lungs were reduced as a sieve and that the internal hemorrhage would soon stop the man from breathing, if before that it was not the heart to stop as this too was in very bad condition. They could do nothing but to assist until the death of the man.
One of the Calabrian volunteers, while going back to their camp, said, "The sawn-off shotgun spares nobody, especially if it hits the chest. Nobody ever lives, that man's death is not your fault, doctor. Our doctors know that, that's why the local doctor didn't want to accept to treat that man..."
They had been a few days in Calabria and were approaching Catanzaro, when they were informed that the Bourbons' army was reorganizing and was reading a resistance in that town. The Garibaldians prepared themselves for the clash - at last, many were saying, a real battle! Orders were issued and the small army of volunteers, inflamed and ready for anything, reached the town. They arrived at the town singing.
Everybody knew that this would be the hardest clash of all they had up to then. The rumor was that the Bourbons' soldiers from all Calabria, still faithful and decided to combat, were pouring in Catanzaro and also that they had cannons. But Garibaldi counted also on the possibility that Catanzaro people, as happened all along their march, were ready to revolt so that the Bourbons would find themselves between two fires.
Garibaldi divided his forces in two groups. While the most numerous was advancing at regular pace, the other, made up of all the youngest, including also the Sicilians and the Calabrians, took a road half way up the hill-side, so that they could outflank the Bourbons postings and to swoop down on their flank.
Enrico and Maurizio obtained two helpers, as they were expecting a high number of wounded men. In the rear, getting over Aprigliano, they prepared all that would be needed - a hospital-tent, field-dressings, bandages, surgical tools. They heard that the clash had started. But they couldn't hear the cannons thundering - this was a good sign, as, at least for the moment, carnage was spared.
Then they received the order to reach Catanzaro - the town was in their hands and the wounded people had been gathered in a church. Enrico, Maurizio and the other two helpers, riding their cart with all the medical supplies, hastened towards the town leaving the rearguard soldiers to break down the hospital tent. While the cart was running, caracoling, pulled by two horses, a shot was heard.
Enrico turned his head towards the source of that unforeseen, incongruous noise, but one of the aid-nurses pulled his sleeve, "Doctor, doctor! Your nurse!" the boy was yelling flushed, pointing to Maurizio.
Enrico looked and saw Maurizio supine on the seat, his hands pressed on his chest, as white as a too often washed sheet, while the other boy was managing to hold him up.
"Maurizio! You were hit!" Enrico shouted worriedly, feeling a cold sweat run down his forehead, and, jumping over his seat, was in front of his young friend.
"Yes..." the young nurse murmured looking at him with eyes filled with pain. Only then Enrico realized that Maurizio did not even yell out when he was hit.
"Where? Let me see..."
"No... It's useless. Run to Catanzaro..."
"If it's useless or not is up to me to decide, after I see you. It is not you who is the doctor, here!"
Maurizio let him push aside his hands - the young man chest was ravaged, and the blood soaked the red shirt making the color darker. Enrico, absurdly, thought that it would have been better if the cloth of their red shirts was of a darker red.
While the cart, on his order, was continuing to run towards Catanzaro, Enrico did a summary examination and it was as if he saw again the chest of the man wounded by the sawn-off shotgun that he could not save and he saw also that Maurizio's chest was even in worst condition.
"So?" Maurizio asked with a light grimace on his deathly pale face.
Enrico would have been able to tell him it was nothing serious, but he could not lie, therefore he kept silent. His silence confirmed to the young man that he had no more hope, as on instinct he already guessed. Enrico asked the other boy to move, sat in his place and took on his lap Maurizio's head. Now the two boys were sitting on the driving bench and Enrico with Maurizio in the back.
They reached Catanzaro and asked for the way to the church where the wounded were attended. Also Maurizio was taken there.
When the boy was laid down on a cloth on the floor, Maurizio told Enrico, "Go to visit the others, you cannot do so much for me, can you? Do your duty."
"Will you wait for me?" Enrico asked, his heart in his throat.
"Yes, I promise." the youth answered, trying to give a hint of a smile.
Enrico knew that Maurizio was right, but parted from him with the death in his heart. He visited rapidly all the men to account for the cases where he had to intervene in time, but he could not take away from his eyes the vision of the devastated chest of his Maurizio - the one who shot him must have used a sawn-off shotgun to butcher in that way the chest of his beloved. Then he noticed, amongst the many faces of his comrades, a known face - it was that Ruggiero, lifeless, and near him there was his boyfriend, Enzo. But a local doctor was already treating him, therefore he passed by.
Other local doctors were arriving to help. Enrico thanked them briefly, signaled two cases he thought urgent then, understanding that his presence was no more strictly needed, went back at the side of his Maurizio. The boy had his eyes shut; a suffering expression on his beautiful face, his face was much paler.
The boy felt his presence and opened his eyes, "Enrico..."
"Shush... don't talk..."
"But why, at this point... isn't it so?"
Enrico nodded, unable to speak and his eyes became misty, but he succeeded in holding back the tears.
"Enrico, forgive me..."
"Forgive you? But for what?"
"You love me..."
"Yes, certainly I do."
"I... if I had some more time, I was telling myself... And on the contrary I should have said you a yes way before and now it is too late."
"You could not."
"I had to. Because I also love you, Enrico. I am... I fell in love with you. It is just that I thought... One believes to be immortal, when he is young. What a silly boy I am, am I not?"
"What are you saying?"
"With more time I would have accepted... but now there is no time left, unhappily. I regret infinitely."
"Accepted?"
"Being yours."
"But you... you are not like me..."
"Really?"
"I know you like me."
"I love you. That night I had not to content myself with holding your hand... I had to come on your bed or ask you to come on mine. I desired that, do you know? But I didn't yet feel ready, that's why I asked you just to hold hands. I wanted to enjoy in silence, there in the dark, the excitation that that contact gave me. I was selfish, and now..."
"No..."
"It is a very meager comfort for you that I understood this only now, and that only now I confess it to you, right?"
"No..."
"But when you see death on its face... you finally are able to see clearly also in yourself... And I would like... I would like so much being yours I would like make love with you... I would like giving myself to you, body and soul... but it is too late, it is no longer possible. Forgive me."
"I love you!"
"Don't say it too aloud, you can be overheard." the boy said with a grimace that wanted to be a smile.
"Who cares?"
"I too love you, Enrico, since... since always. Do you believe me?"
"Sure, my little one."
"Hold my hand, please..."
Enrico took his hand and felt it was covered in blood. He squeezed it.
"Don't leave me... I want to pass away so. I cannot give you anything more, at this point. When I could I didn't, and now..."
"I love you."
"So do I. Forever... and I cannot lie any more, now." Maurizio said with a sad irony.
"Forever," Enrico echoed, and was moved.
"Enrico?" the boy said in a light murmur.
"Tell me."
"From up there I will watch you..."
"I know."
"... so that you can find the right boy..."
"No..." Enrico said in a wail.
"Yes." Maurizio gently said.
"But he will not be you." Enrico said, torn and tormented.
"I know, but he will be the right boy for you."
"You were the one."
"I wasn't able to be it."
"You gave me your friendship, your affection."
"Too little."
"But wonderful."
"Insufficient."
"I love you."
"Yes, you know how to really love." Maurizio said and these were his last words.
At last in his eyes and on his face there was no more suffering, but just a smile. Enrico leaned on him and kissed him, closed his eyelids, set his hand on his chest, like he did that night, he tuck up the cloth covering him, and went back to visit the other patients - he could possibly save some lives, what he couldn't do for the one that was the most precious for him, more than his own life.
Manfredo read on the list of the wounded that there were also Maurizio and Ruggiero and went to visit them. When he entered in the church-hospital, he looked around until he singled out Enrico. He went near him, and saw he was terribly tired, he had his eyes hollow and rings rounded.
"Enrico, I've heard... how is Maurizio?"
"He is well, now. He doesn't suffer any more." the doctor said with a low voice and Manfredo understood.
"But he was on the list of the wounded..." he said almost unbelieving.
"He was. He passed away about an hour ago, I think."
"But... couldn't you..." he started to say but shut up, as he understood he was asking a stupid question, if not cruel.
"I am just a doctor, I am not the good Lord." the man answered with a lump in his throat, and Manfredo cried. "Come on... I managed not to cry and you..." Enrico said almost in a prayer.
"But how... how could it happen? You weren't in the front line!"
"A straggler, I think, but I don't know, from a sawn-off shotgun hit him full in the chest. His lungs devastated, also his heart injured, I think."
"Did he suffer a lot?"
"I think so, but he didn't emit not even a yell, or even a moan. He died as a real man."
"That's a great comfort!" Manfredo retorted with pain, anger, frustration in his voice. Then added, "Maurizio... loved you, was in love with you."
Enrico looked at him amazed, "How can you know?"
"A few days ago... We were sitting close beside each other, and far from inquisitive ears... I told him I liked him, I desired to make love with him..."
"You never change, do you?" Enrico said, but without resentment, without harshness, just noting sadly something.
"But he," the youth continued, "but he told me: I'm sorry, my friend, you are unlucky with me. The day I will say yes to somebody, that one will be Enrico and no one else. So then I asked him: Don't you like me? Do you prefer more adult men? And he: No, that is not the question. I like you, you are a friend. But I am not in love with you. So I asked him: But are you in love with Enrico? And he said: Yes, I am in love with Enrico, even though I don't yet feel ready to give him what he desires from me. But one day I will be ready, I know that. I just need some more time. Swear me that you will not tell him a single word. At the right moment it will be me to tell him to take me. You see, Enrico? But now that he passed away... now I had to tell you." Manfredo said and became silent, drying with the back of his hand his tears.
"Yes, thank you. He told me so, just before he left me." Enrico whispered and at last he too cried.
Manfredo embraced him; they hugged each other and cried, not caring at all about the others.
"My poor, poor Enrico, how much this pains me... It is not fair, no, it is not fair..." Manfredo said, shaken by his sobs.
"This is a war, my friend." Enrico sadly said parting from him, "He knew it could happen, and it did happen. And I was complaining we were never on the front line! Isn't that funny?"
"No, it is not funny at all."
"I know. But now, forgive me, others need my care."
"Enrico..."
"Yes?"
"If you needed me... you know I am your friend, don't you? And... I don't mean in that way... Don't think wrong of me..."
"No, my friend, I know. Thank you. I am still too much dazed, now. Perhaps later... it could do me good having somebody near me, somebody with whom I can talk about him, somebody who can really understand my pain. Thank you Manfredo." Enrico said and went to resume his duty.
Then Manfredo looked for Enzo and Ruggiero. He saw them - the boy was holding the hand of his man between his hands and was looking at him with yearning tenderness. Manfredo felt pleasure at that sight - at least they seemed to have met again. He was hoping that Ruggiero didn't go to join Maurizio. He approached them and asked to Enzo how was Ruggiero doing. Then he proposed him to take some rest while he would watch over Ruggiero.
Ruggiero healed, even though he would have limped for a good while. Anyway the two, with Manfredo's relief, did really reconcile. As Ruggiero could no more follow the Garibaldians, it was decided he would remain in Calabria as provisional governor of Cosenza, in the name and behalf of General Garibaldi, together with Enzo. The Garibaldians left again marching to the north to finish the conquest of the kingdom of the Two Sicilies.
In those days Manfredo remained very close to Enrico. The latter, after burying his Maurizio, gradually gave vent to all his grief, opening his heart to Manfredo, who showed to be full of tact and humanity, so that their friendship deepened and strengthened.
Enrico was a strong man, he didn't allow that loss and the mourning to bend him. He gradually recovered his serenity, even though not his smile. Now the battles were more frequent and Enrico was absorbed by his work. He had been named chief-doctor and had now to his orders three doctors and eight nurses - in fact their army of red shirts was growing while they were approaching Naples and the clashes were increasing, so that also the medical service had to be reinforced and reorganized.
CONTINUES IN CHAPTER 12
In my home page I've put some more of my stories. If someone wants to read them, the URL is http://andrejkoymasky.com If you want to send me feed-back, or desire to help revising my English translations, so that I can put on-line more of my stories in English please e-mail at andrej@andrejkoymasky.com ---------------------------